My buddy sent me this picture. It was the price of a 2×4 from last year to now.
I found myself reminded of this picture from a couple of years ago.
4.2% inflation my itchy butthole.
Reality is much worse than what we are being told.
We’re fucked.
Where a Hispanic Catholic, and a Computer Geek write about Gun Rights, Self Defense and whatever else we can think about.
My buddy sent me this picture. It was the price of a 2×4 from last year to now.
I found myself reminded of this picture from a couple of years ago.
4.2% inflation my itchy butthole.
Reality is much worse than what we are being told.
We’re fucked.
Comments are closed.
I’ll be the first to say that inflation is way under-reported, and it’s real value is well over whatever Big Gov has says it is for the last 20 years. But lumber is also under enormous demand because every Tom Dick and Harry is building in the burbs to escape the shit hole cities and the Kung-Flu. Inflation AND demand AND supply chain problems all contribute these days.
Lumber is bad indicator of inflation today. COVID shut down a lot of lumber production last year. The cost of lumber doubled/tripled overnight as soon as the saw mills shut down production.
Add to that some panic buying in the liberal paradises, and you are artificially inflating the price of a commodity.
Now… if lumber remains at these prices a year or two after saw mills are back to full production, it would be a good indicator. But, right now, this is the equivalent of saying the stock market is going through the roof because of GameStop.
There’s a reason ATMs don’t give singles (never have, as far as I know) and very very few give 5s any more. More and more, though, are dispensing 50s.
Flubnut, CBMTTek, you make good points about the cause of the price increases …. but in the end, the prices have gone up a lot. Knowing why something costs more does not make it more affordable.
$10 for a freaking 2×4, are you kidding me ?
8% and rising inflation according to
http://www.shadowstats.com/alternate_data/inflation-charts
Thing is… lumber isn’t just expensive at the moment, it’s scarce. Demand really does seem to be way up.
In this particular area, not only is demand for lumber up, so is demand for drywall, and for all manner of construction-related labor. We’re trying to hire some home repairs & improvements done, and every reputable business that does such things is fully booked and then some.
When you see the stock market not keeping up with the money supply, part of that is dollars flowing elsewhere… to home construction outside the cities at the moment, as well as to the traditional gold, silver, armaments, and so on.
(Various microcontroller chips are also in extremely short supply right now, and I don’t know how much of that is demand and how much is supply. Another thing to investigate before I start any new designs….)
A lot of people starting doing home remodeling when the COVID Lockdowns started. My BIL said the Home Depot, Menards and Lowes parking lots were busier than on a Black Friday, and stayed busy week after week for months.
Some products like 3/4″ CDX Plywood were in demand to board up windows. Imagine how much plywood it took to board up downtown Minneapolis, Saint Paul, and Brooklyn Center? (and the smart shop owners have stored it all, because they will need it all again.)